Fifty miles southwest of the fire line, I smell the burn,
expect refugees to arrive any minute, jays swooping
down from the mountain, bewildered deer sniffing
the air. What can I offer but a handful of acorns
and empathy? Why would they trust me anyway?
The billboard spells out Yosemite Valley Closed
in lights orange as the sun behind this scrim of smoke.
*
They name the fires
Ferguson, Mendocino Complex, Carr,
and we watch the statistics rise:
57,846 acres; 74,408 acres; 100,154 acres
0%, 3%, 9% contained.
*
From evacuees, words like hellfire, end times.
*
Cause: Vehicle Mechanical Failure
could mean a tractor backfired, or an old
carburetor emitted a spark, which means
it could just as easily have been me
who pulled my ailing Mercury Lynx
over to the shoulder and left it idling
too long in the tinder box. Except
when the mechanic removed my car’s
rust-eaten converter cover, she warned me
not to drive into a field of dry weeds,
which means the difference between
an alpine-blue sky and an octogenarian
found huddled under a wet blanket
with her two great-grandbabies,
all of them dead, is the right words
at the right time, a bit of dumb luck.
*
Mama said, I’m sure
my grandmother
did the best she could
to take care of my babies.
I’m sure she did.
*
In crews named after their tools—
First Saw, Second Saw, Pulaski, McLeod—
inmate firefighters set the line,
clearing fuel between the flames and
that 4000 square foot home,
that canyon of old growth sequoias,
earning $2.43 an hour and maybe
a triangle-folded flag presented
to a loved one at the funeral.
*
Cars inch down the mountain
on melting tires.
Embers rain on windshields.
A white truck’s flank toasts brown.
Through a wall of flames
is no longer a metaphor.
*
Today’s Camp Fire Update:
84 fatalities, 560 missing, 90% contained.
I’m afraid it’s going to get worse.
It’s going to get much, much worse.
*
A man recovers his deceased
mother’s engagement ring
from an ash heap and calls
the charred jeweler’s box
a miracle, the impeccable
diamond, a swirl of rose gold.
*
Cause: a hammer strikes a nail head.
Cause: a cigarette butt flicked from a window.
Cause: a lawnmower blade scythes a rock.
Cause: a windblown powerline’s pyrotechnics
touch down on the 236th day without rain.
*
The school bus driver
ripped his shirt
into pieces he doused
with water
for the children
to hold over their mouths
as the door’s
rubber seal burned.
It’s my first week on the job,
he said. What else
are you going to do?
I kept driving.
*
The black cow grazing the charred hillside
would be invisible if not for her flank
rippling as she steps forward, nosing the ash.
What can she expect to find? The only
bovine for miles in this charcoal on charcoal
sketch set against a parchment sky.
*
Air quality experts recommend
particulate facemasks to filter out
microscopic bits of yellowed
snapshots, noxious chemicals,
green card documentation,
beloved pets, beloveds,
a kindergartener’s handprint,
her grandfather’s mandolin.
*
Smoke presses this truth against the sky:
either your home is on fire, or you’re pulling
someone else’s tragedy into your lungs.
We force our chests to rise.
*
I’m not going to tell you
Greenleaf manzanita seed dormancy
is partially broken by fire.
I’m not going to tell you
Greenleaf manzanita seedlings
appear in large numbers
during the postfire spring.
Forecasters predict
there is no postfire.
Just ink, transcribing the ache.
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